I was wondering why AndroidManifest.xml
is named like this and not simply Manifest.xml
and if this means that there are different types of Manifests? I was reading the information about AndroidManifest but could not find anything. Or do they only want to emphasize that the coupling between the Manifest and Android (OS) is super tight?
Except for some included settings or icons which make a distinction about android built-in things and the option to include your own I have not seen Android name as a prefix except in the Manifest file. For example: the directories in the res
folder have special meaning in android but also don't have the Android prefix or something alike, that makes me wonder even more why they decided to name it AndroidManifest instead of just Manifest.xml.
Best How To :
there are different types of Manifests?
There are many things in Java development that are manifests, such as WEB.XML
in a Java servlet, JAR manifests, etc.
Can you write manifest like files yourself with a different name?
You are welcome to write your own framework that has its own manifest-style file structure for whatever purposes you want.
It almost seems by the way they named it that there could be other Manifests as well.
Not in Android. However, Android is not the only framework in existence, either.
Second if it's not possible to create your own Manifests like files I wonder why it was named this way.
Historical reasons, most likely. The name choice was made close to a decade ago. If you own a time machine, hop back in time, figure out where Android Inc. was based, head over there, and ask them.
On the whole, Google (let alone the old Android Inc. firm they bought) has not provided much in the way of detail about why things are named the way that they are.